


Immortel Amour

by going_slightly_mads (Sanashiya)



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Falling Out of Love, Jealousy, M/M, Major character death - Freeform, Murder Husbands, Post-Episode: s03e13 The Wrath of the Lamb, Will just wants Hannibal to love him again
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-05
Updated: 2016-06-05
Packaged: 2018-07-12 07:36:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,297
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7092466
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sanashiya/pseuds/going_slightly_mads
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Will realizes Hannibal doesn't love him anymore. He thinks he ought to do something to win Hannibal's interest back, and he has a sinking feeling that taking him to the museum or to the opera won't quite do the trick this time. No matter. He'll keep trying until he gets it right.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Immortel Amour

**Author's Note:**

> "Immortel Amour" means "undying love" in French. Keeping the French title because this a translation of a short story that I wrote. 
> 
> I was talking to a friend on Facebook about ever seeing Hannibal come back to life for a S4 and it got me thinking about how I would want this new season to go down. And I thought that the very worst, for me, would be if Hannibal stopped loving Will. I s'pose this is rather unlikely, both because Hannibal will always love Will and because we might not even ever get a S4, but. It was (still is) one of my biggest fears, especially if Clarice Starling comes into the picture.  
> And so I thought I had to write it. And so I did. Sorry not sorry.
> 
>  
> 
> Unbeta'ed, and I'm not an native English speaker. Please feel free to point out any mistakes !

.oOo.

 

It is a day like any other when Will realizes Hannibal doesn't love him anymore. They're just leaving the museum, a temporary exhibition Hannibal wanted to see and for which Will bought tickets. Hannibal is talking with another art amateur at the entrance of the building, on the stone steps, and Will, a bit further away, is waiting for him.

 

When Hannibal turns to him, once his conversation is over, his face doesn't light up like it used to so many times before - and Will, well, he understands Hannibal better than he understands himself. He knows what it means.

 

That day, he decides to blame the fine drizzle that dampens the French soil, the disappointing exhibition, their hunt from the previous night that went wrong (a knife slipping, an organ rendered useless). Hannibal is not one to lose patience over so small a thing, but he isn't God either, despite what they both might think. He has bad days.

 

As weeks go on, Will realizes he quite misunderstood the core of the problem. It is not the rain, nor the exhibition, nor the hunt, that cause the perpetual sour mood Hannibal turns to Will. On the contrary, the source of his irritation, that impacts the rest of his life, is Will himself.

 

And Will doesn't know what to do. He pictured a lot of things, during those last few years, since the very day he embraced Hannibal before throwing them both off a cliff. So many ways their whole enterprise could have gone wrong ; a failed hunt, their apprehension by a foreign government, their extradition to the U.S. A lifetime spent in cell, or death by injection. Above all, the separation.

 

But for Hannibal to stop loving him, that, he couldn't have fathomed. He was weak enough to think himself unique, having heard it so many times, whispered in his ear after a mind-blowing orgasm, or smiled upon the braised lungs of a stranger. His capacity to accept, exceed, _imitate_   even Hannibal's tendencies, granted him a higher status, put him on a pedestal.

 

He was blinded by his self-confidence.

 

Nevertheless, Hannibal seems adamant to keep playing his part splendidly, be it out of respect for the man he used to love, or because he needs time to think of a plan - Will supposes getting rid of a partner in crime and cannibalistic lover must not be so easy. Either way, whenever Will suggests they make love, he barely hesitates before he accepts. Almost imperceptible too is the way his shoulders tense and relax when Will touches his arm affectionately. He makes the effort of falling asleep turned towards Will, never dislodging his head where it rests on his shoulder, and Will forgives him for turning away during the night. In his smiles, the satisfaction and tenderness that used to be there aren't any more, but Will acts as if he doesn't notice.

 

Hannibal never was one for sweet monikers. This part doesn't change. They rarely said "I love you" before – Hannibal doesn't say it at all now, and better a sin of omission than a lie, Will supposes.

 

For a few weeks, he thinks it could almost go on like that. He loves Hannibal, Hannibal lets himself be loved. It's sustainable.

 

Only it isn't, Will finally notices, when the fascination Hannibal used to feel for him finds another recipient. One night, during dinner, Hannibal mentions for the first time Clarice Starling. Will doesn't know her, and so Hannibal tells him she is Jack Crawford's newest recruit : Tattlecrime.com published an article about her, with a subhead : "The New Will Graham". It raises Will's hackles listening to the nickname, for more than one reason, but he stays silent and listens to Hannibal, carefully nodding from time to time.

 

Hannibal needs something new, he realizes. His mind is too sharp, too curious, to stay indefinitely content with the same thing. Will once excited his interest, but now, the entertainment has waned. He has to focus on something else. He might not even be conscious of it, but Will, as ever, doesn't miss a thing.

 

He puts up with Hannibal's longer and longer discussions about Clarice Starling. Hannibal never met her directly, but she intrigues him, just like he knows he intrigued Hannibal once, even before Jack asked for his help about a psychological profile, a few years back – that now seem like a few centuries. His eyes brighten when he mentions her, and Will drinks the expression of awe on his face that is not for him. It makes him want to pick up a knife and remove Hannibal's eyes from their socket ; he'd put the eyeballs on his nightstand, and he'd sleep with that look of wonder endlessly directed at him. Hannibal keeps talking, and Will smiles, lost in his imagination.

 

The day he discovers he can't handle it any more is as insignificant as the day of the exhibition at the museum. They are preparing their gear for the next hunt, both careful, as ever, to stick to this sweet masquerade they have got going on between them, as if it is just enough not to mention a thing for it to stop existing altogether. But Hannibal is silent, more so than usual, and Will observes him closely.

 

When a half-smile flickers on his lips, and his fond look falls on the knife he's sharpening, Will knows who he's thinking about.

 

He knows it isn't him.

 

Slowly, he comes closer, and stops Hannibal's movements to gently take the knife from his hand. He smiles, and Hannibal casts him a surprised look, fondness all but gone, replaced by a vaguely annoyed curiosity. He doesn't like to be interrupted in the middle of his preparations. He doesn't like much about Will, these days.

 

Without saying a word, Will takes the knife, and pushes it into Hannibal's stomach, just above the navel.

 

Time seems to slow its course, and Will can register every little detail of the scene ; the astounded look in Hannibal's eyes, the ray of sun that falls upon his graying hair, the warm, deep red blood dripping on his fingers.

 

Hannibal doesn't react, dumbstruck, and Will puts his hand on his pale cheek. "I love you", he merely says, shrugging apologetically.

 

Curtly, he widens the cut, slipping the knife from left to right, just as Hannibal did so many years before. Somehow, it is only logical that he should die the same way he almost killed Will.

 

He pulls out the knife, and Hannibal falls on his knees on the tiled floor, hand on his wound, speechless, but his incredulous look never leaves Will, who kneels beside him before putting a hand on his forehead. "I love you", he says again.

 

"Will…" And there, for the first time in months, in Hannibal's eyes, he sees it. Behind the shock, behind the pain, he sees pride. He sees satisfaction. For him only. Hannibal's lips twitch into a smile.

 

And right now, Will knows he's won. His unexpected course of action won him Hannibal's interest back. He has found his way to the pedestal again. He smiles tenderly, and gives Hannibal the bloodied knife back.

 

Blade in one hand, dripping intestines in the other, pressed to his stomach, Hannibal leans on the kitchen counter with a mere nod – and Will, who knows him so well, understands what he wants. He sits between Hannibal's legs, back to him, as if it were one of those countless baths they took together, and rests his head on Hannibal's shoulder, neck exposed. Even more than the steel that slices his jugular does he feel Hannibal's lips dropping light kisses on his hair, and that is just how, he thinks, he wanted to go.

 

Now, he knows their love will never die.


End file.
